


How to Romance a Cephalon

by HopeStoryteller



Series: Starchasers [9]
Category: Warframe
Genre: (I will make that an actual tag if I have to do it all by myself), All The Ladies Love Little Duck, Awkward Flirting, F/F, Flirting, Gay, Gay Panic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:48:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22181317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopeStoryteller/pseuds/HopeStoryteller
Summary: Little Duck is a gay disaster, although we all probably knew that already. Biz said she couldn't date a cephalon. Spite is a powerful motivator, as is the power of gay.Alternate title: "Your cubes are pretty."
Relationships: Little Duck/Cephalon Suda, The Business & Little Duck
Series: Starchasers [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1243595
Comments: 7
Kudos: 42





	How to Romance a Cephalon

Getting into one of the Tenno relays is much easier said than done without a direct line to the Lotus or one of the syndicates allowed in. Problem is, getting a direct line to any of the syndicates is really mucking difficult anywhere _outside_ the relays, and no one who’s not a Tenno contacts the Lotus—the Lotus contacts you. Which Little Duck is _obviously_ happy about.

And up until recently, the Lotus certainly hadn’t contacted Little Duck. Not until a certain incident with a cute girl, a void gate, and a couple of Tenno. LD hasn’t seen either of the Tenno since that got cleared—Mitsuki, however, is well on her way to becoming a Quill in Cetus by now—and the Lotus, predictably, hasn’t talked to her once her Tenno were out.

But: the important thing is, she’s got relay access now. The plan was to head to Strata, but something something Fomorians, something something Vay Hek’s ugly mug, something something bye-bye Relay.

So now she’s in Larunda. There’s a crowd, mostly Tenno, gathered around some smarmy mucker selling overpriced Orokin chamberpots. She gives them a quick glance to see if any of them are the Mag or Excalibur she’d worked with—they’re not—and wanders off to the syndicates.

New Loka’s out and then some, hypocritical muckers. Talk about restoration and purity and sic zits on anyone who pisses them off. Arbiters don’t give a damn about anyone who’s not Tenno, Red Veil is a _little_ too enthusiastic about murder, and Perrin talks a lot but won’t help with shit if it’s not ‘profitable.’ And they say they’re not like the taxmen. Corpus. Whatever.

That leaves Steel Meridian, a group which might have actually helped if they’d been around before everything went to shit and she left Fortuna for good, and Cephalon Suda. Little Duck doesn’t actually _know_ much about Cephalon Suda, except that she’ll do nearly anything for knowledge.

Steel Meridian’s place is too crowded. So: decision made. Time to go see Suda.

“Intriguing,” a voice echoes throughout the room as Little Duck steps in. As she continues forward, the drab room of the relay gives way to a brilliant blue datascape. “You have not come here before. I am Cephalon Suda. What is your query?”

Pros of being Solaris: if you’re struggling to form your thoughts into coherent words due to a sudden onslaught of gay feelings, nobody can see it. They just think you’re the strong but silent type. Or something.

Cons of being Solaris: literally everything else.

“Name’s Little Duck,” she manages. 

Hopefully she has some fraction left of the confidence she’d had walking in. She can’t believe she’s currently having a crisis over a group of sentient blue cubes. A group of sentient blue cubes with a very nice voice, mind, but the point still stands. Shit.

_Cephalons are essentially proxies, D. Don’t even try._

Her thoughts sound a lot like Biz today, and that’s a pipeful of pobbers she is _not_ touching right now. She fires back, if silently, _Mucking watch me._

“You want information from hard-to-reach places? I’m your girl,” Little Duck continues. “Course ya use Tenno, but they’re… _not_ stealthy. At all. Most of ‘em, anyways.”

The outer blue cubes spin slowly around the inner one. She gets the distinct feeling she’s being evaluated for something.

“Considering. What compensation would you require?”

“Uh.” She shrugs. “Keeping up with my rig payments would be nice. Didn’t think I’d get this far.”

Suda makes a noise that could be amusement. “Very well. I will send you coordinates.”

* * *

“Little Duck. You’re not serious.” 

LD hums to herself as she polishes her rifle. She pretends not to see Biz’s unimpressed stare. They both know she’s well aware of it.

“You’re serious,” he realizes. 

They’re both waiting for Eudico at the moment. She’s got the hardest cover to maintain, they work these meetings around their schedule. Which LD is fine with. What she’s not fine with is the way Biz still manages to be way too mucking condescending.

So maybe, _maybe_ she’s actively trying to scandalize him with her life choices. She’s bored and spiteful and Eudi’s taking way too long to actually show up. So far she’s one for one.

“Why not?” She asks innocently.

“D, this is a _cephalon_ we’re talking about. You can’t date a cephalon.”

“No, but I sure can tip Nef mucking Anyo off about a kid who would have gotten off scot-free.”

Biz doesn’t dignify that with a response. Instead, he replies, “Is that _really_ why you’ve been running missions for Cephalon Suda?”

She shrugs. “She pays well. _But_ considering how many times I’ve nearly died, not well enough. So. Pretty much. I’d date her.”

“This is a cephalon we’re talking about. Essentially a glorified proxy, if that. A voice and a group of polygons. You can’t date _shapes_.”

“In my defense, she has a very _nice_ voice. What, you’ve never mucked around with a hot cephalon lady?”

“Obviously not!”

A long-suffering sigh comes from the direction of the door. Little Duck glances over, sees Eudi leaning against it. Somehow she gets the feeling she’s been there for a while.

“What are you two going on about _now?”_

Eudi sounds quite possibly more tired than she is. LD hasn’t gone into a sleep cycle in at least three days. They both should probably sleep at some point soon.

Nah.

“Hi, Eudi,” D says a little too cheerfully. “We were just talking about dating cephalons.”

“You _cannot date a cephalon, Little Duck.”_

Eudi looks at her, and at Biz, and at LD again. “Do I even want to know?”

“No,” Biz says, right as Little Duck says the opposite. 

* * *

Time to date a cephalon.

No, actually, that’s why LD’s here. Partially to spite Biz and prove a point, but mainly to attempt… to ask out… a cephalon. Specifically Cephalon Suda. Maybe she didn’t think this through as well as she should have. Or really at all. Maybe this was mostly motivated by spite. But spite is one hell of a motivator, and she has a legitimate reason for being here?

Really, she does. She had swung by Fortuna on her way back from an op for Suda in one of the more infested parts of Mercury. So she _does_ have a legitimate reason for being here, getting Suda the data she wanted.

And maybe—how do you date a cephalon? How do you _ask out_ a cephalon? Just go up to them and say their cubes are pretty, wanna go out? Little Duck is _pretty_ sure that would go about as well as Deck 12. Possibly even worse.

She does have a legitimate reason for being here. So if she chickens out, she can finish up her business and (ha) duck out. It’s probably a fifty-fifty shot on what will win out, spite or anxiety. 

Here’s to finding out which one!

“Hey there, Su!” 

As good a greeting as any, especially when you’re lugging in a datamass half your size in. A datamass that also, incidentally, takes two hands to carry. Maybe she should have thought this through a bit better before she took a hand off it to wave, and turned to greet Cephalon Se— _SUDA. Cephalon SUDA._

“That’s going to fall,” Cephalon Suda greets in return.

Little Duck lets it go and leaps forwards with a slightly panicked yelp. The datamass crashes to the floor, but void, if it survived being stuck in a nest of zits for however long it did, it’ll survive being dropped in a Relay. Probably. Hopefully.

“Thanks,” she says breathlessly. “Hi.”

“Hello, Little Duck. I assume that is the data I requested?”

LD just nods. She really, _really_ doesn’t trust herself to speak at the moment. Suda makes a pleased noise, and she trusts herself even less.

“Excellent, thank you. Leave it there, I will extract it later.”

This is, usually, how their song and dance goes. Little Duck comes in from a mission no one sane would take, successfully of _course_ , and hands off the data. Suda thanks her, and Little Duck leaves almost immediately after. Problem is, if she does that she’ll be missing her chance to… well, ask. About things.

So she lingers. Bit longer than usual. Tries to gather her thoughts.

Unfortunately, Suda starts speaking again first. “Did the mission go satisfactorily?”

“Peachy,” LD replies. “As well as usual, anyway.”

“You are here in one piece and not infected with the Infestation, or you would have been detained before you could enter the Relay. The datamass is present in one piece as well. While the results are satisfactory, I would prefer to keep my best operative capable of continuing in the future. Data is always backed up. You are not. Be more careful.”

Little Duck should argue. She _really_ should. But on the other hand, it had been a little too close for comfort. A lot too close for comfort. _Maybe_ she had to use the datamass to get into a vent duct, kick it over so the zits couldn’t come up after her, and spend three orbit-hours twiddling her thumbs and hoping the datamass was too heavy for them to carry off. Also that there wasn’t another vent entrance elsewhere that they could access.

“Okay,” she says instead. “Thanks.”

“You’re very welcome.” Suda’s voice takes an amused lilt to it as she adds, “Do try not to drop the datamass on yourself next time. Have you another query?”

Oh. Right. Shit.

What Little Duck could say: “No, I gotta get back to Fortuna. Y’know, me and the mates, mucking up the taxmen. I’ll bring ya back some juicy tidbits on ol’ Nef if ya want. Or a recording of whatever the ventkids are calling music.”

What Little Duck should say: “Yes, actually. Two, funny thing that. Are cephalons capable of romance, and will you go out with me? First one’s to settle an argument, second one’s ‘cause I think you’re neat.”

What Little Duck actually says: “Your cubes are pretty.”

“Oh?” Suda replies. She draws back a little, yet sounds intrigued when she says, “You really think so?”

“Yeah, I. I guess. Yeah! A whole lot else too, but yeah. Your cubes are pretty. Very.”

Suda hums to herself. In any _other_ situation, LD would think it sounds vaguely approving, but this is _this_ situation. So. Yeah.

“A cephalon’s appearance is chosen based on their own aesthetic, and reflects their personality holistically. The good, the bad… all is there, if the viewer examines them closely. It has been said that a cephalon’s appearance is a reflection of their very soul.”

“Oh,” Little Duck says, because what else _are_ you supposed to say to this?

Suda clears her throat, or at least imitates the sound of doing so, and asks, “Are you doing anything tonight?”

* * *

“Guess who’s dating a cephalon?”

Eudi and Biz glance up. Biz audibly groans.

“No,” Biz says as she takes her place at the table.

“Yes,” Little Duck says far too cheerfully. “Suck my dick, Biz. I got a date with the cube.”

Biz groans even louder. “This is ridiculous.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Both of you, _stop,”_ Eudi orders. “For the record: I don’t care who’s mucking around with who, and if that’s the worst of our problems, we’re in good shape. Keep your arguing outside. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“Understood,” Biz agrees.

Later, he’s the first to leave. Eudi is the second. She high-fives Little Duck before she goes.

**Author's Note:**

> I have nothing to say for myself except that all the ladies love Little Duck, and this is almost entirely Su's fault. (Almost.)
> 
> Also, _wow_ do I wish I had Little Duck's confidence.


End file.
